Prologue
Luke's Journal Entry
Friday, October 13, 2006
The brain tends to trick us into believing things that are not there. We've all seen it, or heard it. The brain is believed to be the more horrifying than any reality. The brain is the place where all horror stories and movies come from, after all. Emily Dickinson once wrote, "One need not be a chamber to be haunted; one need not be a house; The brain has corridors surpassing a material place." So, what happens when your brain starts to deceive you? Will you run and hide? Will you face your worst fears? Or instead, would you seek them out, eliminating them one by one?
Chapter One
"Well, here we are!" Haley James Scott exclaimed excitedly as her husband, Nathan, pulled his car up the driveway to an old plantation house 15 miles outside the town of Tree Hill, North Carolina. The car held Nathan, Brooke Davis, Peyton Sawyer, Lucas Scott, and herself.
"Remind me what we're doing here again, Tutor Wife?" Brooke asked as she sat up from the back seat as Nathan parked the car.
"We are going to be a part of a mystery show here at the Stagville Plantation," Haley answered. At Brookes glare, she added, "Come on, it will be fun!"
"But it's Friday night!" Brooke complained, but she exited the car with the rest of the gang. "Just don't expect me to do anything but sleep!" She turned to Lucas. "Unless, of course, you want do a little something."
"Have you given into being with just me, yet?" Luke asked the Brunette.
Brooke rolled her eyes. "Whatever. You're the one missing out."
The gang walked up the dirt sidewalk and waited at the door as Haley knocked. A tall brown-haired man, who looked to be just out of college, opened the door.
"Ah, you must be my…victims," the man said. "Come in. I'm Bradley Warshaw, the creator and producer of 'America's Ghostlands'. You can call me 'Brad'."
As the gang entered the house, Peyton whispered to Haley. "Victims? Ghostlands? What is this show about, Haley?"
"Well, legends and folklore," Haley explained. Peyton gave her a "what have you gotten us into" face. "Don't be a wuss! It was my idea, and you know how much of a scaredy-cat I can be!"
The gang entered into a living room covered in old furniture. Brooke made a disgusted sound. "Why am I here?" she complained, softly. But looking around, she noticed how serene the place seemed.
Brad turned to them. "You are in the Bennehan House. This is where you'll be staying, along with the Horton House, Horton Grove, and the Great Barn. You can go anywhere around the plantation, but you most be wearing these"—he picked up five cameras sitting on a couch—"at all times."
"Umm, sorry Mr. Producer Guy," Brooke started, "but what is supposed to be so scary about this place? It looks kind of peaceful."
Brad answered, "Stories of ghosts and hauntings at Historic Stagville Plantation go back for decades. Neighbors of the plantation have reported strange lights in the windows of the former slave quarters and a nearby house that was rented to sharecroppers. The apparition of a young African-American girl has been seen several times at the slave quarters, prompting several grounds people to abandon their equipment and flee in fright. In recent years, the Sheriff's Department and Fire Department have responded to false alarms at the Great Barn, and have reported seeing the apparition of an adult African-American male in the loft.
"The staff of the plantation has experienced several unexplained events in the main house, including doors locking and unlocking as they watched, the sound of footsteps when no one else was there, and voices murmuring. One particular evening, a staff member was locking up the main house when she heard footsteps coming from the second floor. She went upstairs to check, and no one was there. She quickly set the alarm and left by the front door. She waited for some time, watching the house, but no one emerged. The next morning, her supervisor informed her that the motion detector in the main house had been triggered, but did not set off the alarm. She also found a skeleton key which rests in the keyhole of the front door several feet from its usual place, lying on an antique couch."
He paused and let his story sink in before continuing. "You are going to spend the night here looking for the ghost, or ghosts, that haunt this land."
Chapter 2
"What the hell have you gotten us into, Tutor Wife?" Brooke asked, as the teens put on their cameras. After telling them the story, Brad had stepped outside into the America's Ghostlands trailer to check on equipment.
"Relax, Brooke," Peyton told her. "It'll be fun."
"Yeah, fun until the ghost stabs you to death in your sleep," Brooke told her.
Lucas stepped in. "I thought the whole point was to not go to sleep?"
"Pfft!" Brooke told her. "Tomorrow's Saturday. I'm not going to the mall looking like a zombie."
"Well, look on the bright side," said Haley. "If you turn into a zombie, you won't have to worry about looking like one. You'll be one." She gave a teasing smile.
Brad came back inside, and interrupted their conversation. "Okay guys, the sun is just about to go down. I trust you all have eaten?"
"We stopped on the way up," Nathan assured him.
"Great!" Brad exclaimed. "Camera's are on, and we're ready to rock."
"Ready and waiting," Brooke told him, with a smile. "Are you going to be here all night, too?"
"I'll be in the van monitoring you," Brad said. He looked at his watch. "We go on live on the internet in 5 minutes." He opened the front door, and turned to say one last thing before he exited. "Good luck."
Brooke sat on an antique couch. She would have been bored to tears if she wasn't wearing masquera. Instead she was just bored. What's there to do on an old plantation anyway? she thought.
Naley, Lucas, and Peyton had gone outside to explore the grounds before the sun fell all the way down. Brooke, afraid to get too much dirt on her new shoes, decided to stay inside. Which doesn't sound like such a good idea anymore.
She heard a loud CCCCRRREEEAAAKKK! from another room.
"If you're trying to scare me, it isn't going to work," Brooke said aloud. "It's not even that dark yet!" The sun was just setting, so the house was filled with an eerie orange glow.
Silence.
"Guys?" Brooke asked, standing up from her position on the couch. "Hello-o." She took a step in the direction of the noise. "Luke, if you make me come find you, don't even think about anything between us later."
Silence.
"Guys!" Brooke said as she walked toward the room.
The room appeared to be a dining room. The table was set with a white cloth, which had turned yellow, over the years and silver dinnerware that looked like it hadn't been polished in about three decades.
She heard another CCCCRRREEEAAAKKK! And looked past the table and saw a kitchen. She saw a figure walk past the doorway. "Luke? Tutor girl? Is that you?"
She walked through the room and into the kitchen. The figure appeared to be in front of the sink. "Hey, you okay?"
The figure turned around, and stared at Brooke. A gust of wind blew at her, as the figure of a young African American girl shouted something inaudible at her.
Brooke heard a loud scream, and it took her a few seconds to realize that scream was hers. She turned around and ran out of the house, her screams filling the air.
Chapter 3
Brooke ran into Luke and Peyton as she was exiting the house. Lucas grabbed her. "Brooke. Hey, what's going on?"
"Sh-she's in there!" Brooke told him.
"Who?" Peyton asked.
"The slave girl!" Brooke looked at Lucas. "Aren't ghosts supposed to be not real?"
"Brooke, I'm sure it was nothing," Peyton assured her. "You were in there alone."
Brooke shook her head. "No! I saw her."
Lucas looked over at the van. "Look, if it will help, we can ask Brad to show us the feed." He looked into her eyes. "If there's nothing there, will you be okay?"
Brooke nodded. Then she realized something was missing from this picture. "Where's Nathan and Haley?"
Peyton looked at Lucas. "They had to…talk."
Haley and Nathan were walking down a dirt path.
But not talking, Haley thought. Why won't he talk to me? He said we could be friends. But friends talk. He hasn't said one word to me since we left Tree Hill.
Nathan stopped. "Haley, this is stupid."
Haley lost her trail of thought. "What?"
"This." He pointed to the camera. "All of this. This camera, this night, us. Everything. It's just- I thought this would be fun. But it isn't. I don't know. Maybe because-"
"Because we aren't together?" Haley suggested. "Because you don't know what you want, and it's killing you inside?" She stepped closer to him, placing her hand on his, and looking up into his eyes. "I know what you're going through. I went through it last year. And we've had this discussion a million times, but it seems as though it's not working, so why don't we not?"
"Not what?"
"Do this," Haley answered, taking her hand off of his. "I don't know how I can say it any better than 'I love you', but that just doesn't seem enough for you. I won't lie. I had a good time on tour. But it would have been so much better if you were there with me."
Nathan saw all the sincerity in her eyes. "I love you too, Hales. I do. I just don't trust you."
"Well, how are you supposed to start to trust me when you won't even talk to me?" Haley retorted. "You haven't said one word to me all night. Nathan, I thought we were past this."
"We are," Nathan assured her. "You just got to give me time."
"Fine!" Haley told him. "Take all the time you want." With that, she turned her heel, and walked down the trail. Even Nathan's pleas didn't make her turn around.
Lucas, Peyton, and Brooke looked at the monitor in shock as Brad showed them Brooke's feed of the kitchen. The girl Brooke saw was real. Brad had two feeds on the screen, one Brookes, and one, a permanent camera in the kitchen. And the one in the kitchen showed the girl disappearing almost into thin air as Brooke ran out of the room, a silent evil laugh lingering on her face as she disappeared.
